Special town meeting convenes on Monday

LAKEVILLE — Town voters will be asked to weigh in on 10 articles at the special town meeting to be held Monday night at 7 p.m. The Board of Selectmen held a warrant review of the articles this week.

Town Administrator Rita Garbitt explained that the first article is primarily a house-keeping article to re-vote where revenues voted at the annual town meeting will be taken from.

"The amount we went to town meeting with for free cash had not been certified. Free cash ended up being $178,496 - $21,504 less (than was voted) so, article one is just re-voting certain revenues for the annual budget," she said.

The second article, which seeks to transfer monies between various departments to cover expenses elsewhere, still has to be finalized. An announcement from Governor Patrick Monday that the police department will receive money to rehire two laid-off police officers and a full-time dispatcher initially had Selectwoman Nancy Yeatts removing $32,000 she had worked to find to bring back one officer for the remaining seven months of the fiscal year. However, Police Chief Mark Sorel argued that the funding was still necessary.

"It's wonderful, yes, that I'm getting two police officers back. However, there's 31 weeks left in the fiscal year. I have 29 weeks of vacation to fill with officers. I have one officer on light duty, and soon to be on maternity. I've already had 2,249 incidents. I've had to fill 67 shifts in overtime just to keep a minimum of one person, and I've had 20 one-man shifts, and some parts of the shift, no coverage in the town at all," he said.

He pointed out that when bad weather comes, there will be times with one officer, and possibly some with no officer, with snow on the road.

"I think the safety has been jeopardized enough now," he said, asking for at least $10,000 to cover for overtime.

He added that when the two officers are re-hired, he will have to cover those vacation weeks as well, and will lose another officer from the road when the officer on light-duty goes out on maternity leave.

"It's going to be where I'm not going to fill the shifts," he said. "I just think the town can't go — and I'm one-man shifts, like I said, 20 times since October"¦.if anybody gets hurt, or sick, it puts us right out."

Ms. Yeatts said she was onboard with leaving money for overtime, but not for bringing back another police officer that would have to be laid off again.

Selectman Charles Evirs suggested that the money could be taken from unemployment, especially where the two officers would be coming off of unemployment. Chief Sorel suggested that some funds could be transferred from the gas line item, since there have not been as many patrols, and added it to some for overtime, there would be enough to fund a third officer.

"I'd rather have three guys, two of them for a year, one for seven months, than not," he said.

Ms. Garbitt agreed to work with Chief Sorel to finalize the numbers prior to the Monday night meeting.

Two articles on the warrant pertain to the schools, including one to ratify the teachers' contract and transfer money from health insurance to the school department. That money will bring the teachers in line with the other town employees with regard to the employee contribution for health insurance benefits. The second article seeks to take $86,625 from stabilization to create a revolving account for a newly created special education program at Assawompset School. This article stipulates that the funds will not be spent until the regional schools fund an already approved special education teacher at the elementary school.

"This money will come out of the regular town stabilization account in the anticipation of it being able to go back because we're still looking at one outstanding gas company from the MBTE lawsuit. When that check comes in, this money will be replaced," Ms. Yeatts said. "Otherwise, we wouldn't be able to do it"¦that's the plan, that it will be able to go back. I would never take money out of stabilization for something like this unless we had a way to put it back."

One article seeks to lease a front-end loader for the highway department. Superintendent of Streets Christopher Peck said the five-year lease would cost $28,236 a year, and the town would be able to purchase the loader at the end of the lease for a cost of $1. The funding would come from Chapter 90 funds, which are allowed to be used for roadway construction and also roadway construction equipment.

"The loader that we currently have is a 1984, it's on its last legs, and the last thing we want to have happen is for it to break down this winter while we're trying to load sanders or trying to remove snow from intersections. If that happens, our back up is a lot smaller machine, it's going to take us twice as long and we might not be able to load the sanders," he said.

Three articles would establish the Board of Selectmen as a Water Commission, set up a revolving fund to use for water billing and expenses, and allow the town to address delinquent payers.

Also on the warrant is an article submitted by petition seeking to rezone three properties on Main Street from residential to business zoning, including the historic library, the Assessors' office, and 237 Main Street, which currently houses Heritage Flowers and Balloons, and a final article seeking to accept DeMoranville Drive as a town way.